Cyrus' Paradise

This is not an exact parallel, but I’m reminded of Xenophon Anabasis 3.4.35, where it is said that the Persians out on campaign are slow to get off the mark in the event of a night attack because they hobble their horses.

See the index to the Loeb, where it is suggested that these Armenian Chaldaeans are a people more correctly known as the Haldi.

I wonder if it’s a bit of a stretch to look for parallels with Sparta here, since elders had similar functions in a great many premodern societies.

The tone of this interchange reminds me of the dialogue between Pericles and Alcibiades at Xenophon Memorabilia 1.2.40-46. And for a wise, even if not wisecracking, child, how about Gorgo at Herodotus 5.51?

Surely just because it means ‘whatever makes your bread less dull’!

Reza Zarghamee’s blog posts on this site argue very convincingly that, yes, there could have been an Iranian tradition that leapfrogged back past Cambyses’ reign and attributed the conquest of Egypt to Cyrus.

What’s going on with Median ἰσηγορία? Is this a little Xenophontic jibe directed toward Athens, which was famed for that “freedom/license/excessive of speech”?

On this see now Norman’s own Sandridge 2012.

Hale, J. R. 2013. “Not Patriots, Not Farmers, Not Amateurs: Greek Soldiers of Fortune and the Origins of Hoplite Warfare.” In Donald Kagan and Gregory F. Viggiano (eds.), Men of Bronze: Hoplite Warfare in Ancient Greece. (Princeton; Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2013): 176-193

Luraghi, N. 2006. “Traders, Pirates, Warriors: The Proto-History of Greek Mercenary Soldiers in the Eastern Mediterranean.” Phoenix 60.1/2: 21-47

On Greek soldiers in the service of foreign kings, see also Luraghi 2006 and Hale 2013. On the rhetorical, panhellenist context see especially the speeches of Isocrates.